The Melville-Hawthorne Connection

This book offers the first in-depth examination of the friendship between the authors. Hawthorne’s influence upon Moby-Dick is weighed, as is the probability of Melville’s influence upon Hawthorne. This was a friendship whose true basis—beyond an almost instantaneous mutual affinity and admiration for each other—was intellectual ideas and literary pursuits, and the conversations between the two hewed mostly to philosophical and spiritual rumination as well as to those matters that concern writers most: craft and publishing.

Erik Hage is an author, critic, and cultural reporter from upstate New York, where he is a professor of Journalism and Communication at the State University of New York at Cobleskill.

Erik Hage
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 220
Bibliographic Info: 8 photos, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2014
pISBN: 978-0-7864-7076-1
eISBN: 978-1-4766-0633-0
Imprint: McFarland

Preface and Acknowledgments  1
One. Friendship; or, The Ambiguities  7
Two. The Freshness of Primeval Nature: Monument Mountain and the Mosses  44
Three. Loomings; or, Early Lives of the Authors  77
Four. Annus Mirabilis; or, The Haunted Mind and the Whale  108
Five. Monody  168
Chapter Notes  189
Bibliography  203
Index  207

• “The readings of the novels, especially Moby-Dick, are excellent, and Hage’s prose is graceful and metaphorical”—Choice
• “An engaging acutely sensitive study…much to appreciate…thoughtful and thought-provoking…a worthy and appealing study…gracefully written commentary…a welcome guide…a fitting tribute to the enduring fascinations of these towering literary figures.”—Nathaniel Hawthorne Review
• “A perceptive and nuanced reading of the friendship between Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville and the importance that this relationship held for both men. Drawing upon an array of sources…Hage returns our attention to key questions about this relationship, not only in terms of its personal aspects, but also as it affected the development of both writers.”—Melissa Pennell (UMass Lowell), author of the Student Companion to Nathaniel Hawthorne and Masterpieces of American Romantic Literature
• “The reader is treated to a compelling analysis of each author’s literary influence upon the other, a ‘literary kinship’ that was forged, if not in fire and blood, at least in cigar smoke, brandy, and mutual artistic admiration during 1850–51.”—Randall A. Clack (Wesley University), author of The Marriage of Heaven and Earth: Alchemical Regeneration in the Works of Taylor, Poe, Hawthorne, and Fuller
• “Unifies our biographical understanding of the two men’s ‘literary kinship.’ Hage’s in-depth analysis of this influential friendship will appeal to a wide audience because of its readability and insights.”—Sharon Talley (Texas A&M–Corpus Christi), author of Ambrose Bierce and the Dance of Death and the Student Companion to Herman Melville